Published on 6 September 2025 in Client Alerts

Central African Republic militia leaders convicted of war crimes at the International Criminal Court

On 24 July 2025, the International Criminal Court (the “ICC”) convicted two former Central African Republic (“CAR”) militia leaders of multiple war crimes and crimes against humanity.  The crimes took place in the context of the 2012-2014 CAR conflict between the Seleka and Anti-Balaka militia groups in Bangui, the CAR’s capital, and in the west of the CAR.

Patrice-Edouard Ngaïssona and Alfred Yekatom, leaders of the Anti-Balaka militia, were convicted of multiple crimes in connection with brutal attacks against predominantly Muslim civilians.  The convictions marked the culmination of a trial at the ICC that first began in February 2021.

Mr Yekatom was convicted of multiple crimes committed in the context of the attack on Bangui; events at Yamwara, where he had established a militia base; and during the advance of his militia group on the PK9- Mbaïki axis.  These included attacks against the civilian population as such, murder, forcible transfer and deportation, displacement, directing an attack against a building dedicated to religion, torture, cruel treatment, other inhumane acts, imprisonment and other severe deprivation of physical liberty, and persecution.  The ICC sentenced him to 15 years’ imprisonment. 

Mr Ngaïssona was convicted of aiding and abetting many of the same crimes:  attacks against the civilian population as such, murder, forcible transfer and deportation, displacement, directing an attack against a building dedicated to religion, torture, cruel treatment, other inhumane acts, imprisonment and other severe deprivation of physical liberty, destruction of property and persecution.  He was sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment.

The convictions followed a nearly four-year trial involving over 170 witnesses and nearly 20,000 pieces of evidence. The prosecutors alleged that the two coordinated anti-Balaka militias targeting the Muslim population after the predominantly Muslim Seleka rebels seized power in 2013. Mr Ngaïssona, who also served briefly as CAR’s sports minister and was elected to the Confederation of African Football’s executive committee in 2018, was arrested in France in 2018 and transferred to the Hague in 2019. Mr Yekatom, a former MP, was arrested in 2018 after he fired a gun in parliament. Both men denied all charges throughout the proceedings.

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